John Smith (explorer)
'John Smith '(c. January 1580 - June 21, 1631) was an English soldier, explorer, and author. He was knighted for his services to Sigismund Bathory, Prince of Transylvania, and his friend Moses Szekely. He was considered to have played an important part in the establishment of Jamestown, the first permanent English settlement in North America. He was a leader of the Virginia Colony between September 1608 and August 1609, and led an exploration along the rivers of Virginia and the Chesapeake Bay. He was the first English explorer to map the Chesapeake Bay area and New England. Smith was baptized on January 6, 1580 in Lincolnshire, England as the son of George Smith and Alice Richard. Smith was given some schooling and apprenticed to a merchant, Thomas Sendall. After his father's death in 1596, Smith left Sendall for France to take up soldiering. He returned home briefly in late 1599 or early 1600, before setting out for central Europe to fight with the Austrian Empire against the Turks. In Hungary, Smith acquired a reputation for bravery that he exploited in his 1630 autobiography. Taken captive by Turks, Smith escaped and traveled through Russia and Poland before making it back to England in late 1604 or early 1605. Smith's father had urged him to be a merchant, but the restless Englishman wanted to see the world. In 1606, he offered his services as a colonist to the Virginia Company, a group of merchants charged with starting an English colony in North America, recalling his vision of the opportunities that awaited those who settled the Americas. In April of 1607, nearly four months after the Virginia Company's three ships had left England, they reached the North American shore. Sailing part way up a broad river leading into the Chesapeake Bay, the colonists selected a small, defensible peninsula and built Fort James to protect the settlement of Jamestown, named for their king. Unlike Spanish colonies, which were funded by Spanish rulers, the English colonies were originally funded by joint-stock companies. Stock companies allowed several investors to pool their wealth in support of a colony that would yield a profit. Investors in the Jamestown colony demanded a quick return on their investment, and Smith hoped to find gold to satisfy him. Consequently, he neglected farming and soon suffered the consequences. Disease from contaminated river water struck the colonists first, followed soon by hunger. Smith held the colony together by forcing the colonists to farm and by securing food and support from native Powhatan peoples. After his exploration of the Chesapeake Bay in the summer of 1608, he suffered a severe injury to his leg by gunpowder from one of the fights with the natives. He returned to England in October 1609. Smith returned to the Americas in a voyage to the coasts of Maine and Massachusetts Bay in 1614. He named the region "New England," and published a map in 1616. He made two attempts to return to the same coast, but in his second attempt, he was captured by French pirates. He escaped after weeks of captivity and made his way back to England, where he published an account of his two voyages as A Description of New England. Smith died on June 21, 1631. He never married and had no children.